• Slide Deck

Given growing interest in data science education, state and district Computer Science for All efforts are seeking ways to incorporate data science into computer science courses as well as in other courses at the secondary level. In partnership with the New York City Department of Education’s Computer Science Education Team, Education Development Center developed sample data science activities for integration into middle and high school classes from a range of subject areas including mathematics, history, science, and traditional computer science classes.

During this talk we’ll share three activities we adapted for integration from the Beauty and Joy of Computing (BJC) AP Computer Science Principles and Sparks Middle School/Early High School Curriculum. Through these activities students collect and use digital data in a computational artifact, refine and visualize data sets, and tell stories with the data sets. A variety of data sets are introduced including world health and squirrel census data. Activities and the associated lesson plans will be available as resources for the audience.

Furthermore, we will discuss our development process including our goals for the integration model, the process through which we chose and adapted the activities, and how Snap! prompts student learning of computer science and data science topics. Lessons learned will be shared, including feedback from teachers who implemented the lessons in their classrooms. At the end, we will invite discussion about ways to integrate data science into existing secondary courses, and ways that Snap! can support data science exploration.